With time running out in regular season, Howard, Beverley out for 8th consecutive game

Rockets starting point guard Patrick Beverley and center Dwight Howard will sit out for an eighth-consecutive game tonight against the Timberwolves, leaving just three regular-season games for them to get some playing time before the playoffs.

Rockets coach Kevin McHale said he did not know if Beverley and Howard will play on Saturday against the Pelicans in Houston. Beverley has been out with a torn knee cartilage. Howard has missed 10 of the Rockets past 12 games with a strained ankle. Both have been on the Rockets’ road trip, increasing their workouts in hopes of returning to the court.

“They will not play tonight,” McHale said. “That’s all I know. I don’t know about tomorrow. We need Patrick back. There no teams in the league that you take two of your starters out. The league is not that deep. We need everybody back and playing well.”

McHale said it was a greater concern that both return in time to be sharp for the post-season than to rebuild cohesion with the Rockets rotation.

“They’ve played enough this year together that shouldn’t be a huge, huge issue,” he said. “Mostly, for timing. You have to get a little bit of timing. A few games I think will be great. We really want to get that.”

The Rockets need any combination of two wins or Trail Blazers losses to clinch homecourt advantage, but considered how they are laying when the post-season starts more important than where.

“That’s the most important thing,” Harden said. “You see that with Indiana. You just want to be playing the right way. It doesn’t really matter about homecourt advantage because on the playoffs you have to win on the road anyway. It’s most important to be playing well and playing together and having that confidence going into the post-season.

“Getting everybody healthy is what we talk about a lot. We have four games to make sure we do it the right way.”